


Ye Of Little Faith

by TheTurtleFromHell



Category: Castlevania (Cartoon), 悪魔城ドラキュラ | Castlevania Series
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Conversations, Enemies to Friends (but they don't know it), Gen, Introspection, Post-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-11
Updated: 2020-09-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:47:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26399662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheTurtleFromHell/pseuds/TheTurtleFromHell
Summary: After Lindenfeld, Sypha’s faith in humanity has been shaken. Isaac knows what that's like.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	Ye Of Little Faith

**Author's Note:**

> listen i know in canon they are countries away from each other, but for the sake of this fic let's pretend otherwise ok? ok.

Isaac sighed as he looked over his army, lined up in front of the mirror. Everything was set to go, he just needed to wait until sunrise to launch his attack. Until then, he had the night to himself.

He descended down the stairs and out of the tower, deciding to see if he could find a well and draw some water for a quick scrubbing, before treating himself to a warm meal. It was important to care for and treat the body well before putting it through the turmoil of a siege after all.

But as he reached the front steps of the tower, he found someone who wasn’t there before, someone who clearly didn’t belong to the magician’s city.

Isaac stops in his track just as the Speaker woman turns around, both exchanging a look of surprise.

He can sense magic from her that he knows he remembers from somewhere, but he can’t place when and where.

She looks just as battletorn as he does, barely healed cuts all over her exposed arms and face. He remembers Speakers being more heavily covered than this, but perhaps she is from a tribe that has a different style than the ones he’s seen.

“Do you live here?” she asks in an accent heavy voice that’s a little on edge.

“For the time being.” Isaac half-truths, “I wasn’t planning on staying long.”

“Oh,” she says as she turns back around, “Then you probably don’t know what happened here, do you?”

“What do you mean?”

“A big city with no people.” she clarifies, motioning to the empty town surrounding the tower.

“Probably what usually happens,” he says as he walks over, sitting down by her side, “The townsfolk were driven out by famine or war, one of the two.”

She hums in thought, “Unfortunate.” she said, seemingly agreeing with his made-up theory, “So what brings you here?”

“Stopped here looking for supplies.” he replies, “And you?”

“Same reason.” she sighs, “My partner and I were running low on water after cleaning our wounds. He stopped here to look for a well.”

His eyes travel down to the aforementioned injuries, “... I have some salve for those.”

The Speaker looks up as he rummages through his pockets, pulling out a small tin, “Here,” he said as he placed it in the palm of her hand, “There’s not a lot, so I’d just use it one the ones you’re worried about getting infected.”

She smiled a tiny smile, holding it to her chest like it contained precious gold, “What’s your name?” she asked, “So that I can properly thank you.”

“Isaac.” he answers.

“Thank you Isaac,” she says gratefully, “I am Sypha.”

He smiles back and shrugs, “You seem to need it more than me.”

“I did need this, in more ways than one.” she sighs as she turns it in her hand.

“Something happened?” he said it more as a statement than an actual question, and the tired nod he received was all the confirmation he needed.

There’s a beat of silence, one Isaac finds uncomfortable. The old Isaac wouldn’t have cared for this woman and her troubles, would have thought she was just another human that needed to be wiped from the earth. The old Isaac would have thought the same of the Shopkeeper, the Captain, and Miranda.

But Isaac had changed, had been given gifts and conversation by his fellow humans and wanted to return the favors. He wanted to reach out and help Sypha with her troubles… the problem was, he was very new to all of these feelings, and wasn’t quite sure he knew the right way to go about things. So, he chooses his words very carefully,

“I can’t promise I’ll have the solution, or that I’ll even say the right things,” he begins, staring at his folded hands, “But I’ll at least listen, if that helps.”

Sypha considers his words for a moment, “I think it will.” she says, taking a deep breath as she recounts her story, “My partner and I are monster hunters, or we’ve been doing it for a few months. It was fun, full of adventure and danger, it was everything I ever wanted.” 

Her smile falters then, falling into a frown, “Then… we came across this town called Lindenfeld. We were hired by the head of the town to investigate a mysterious church. It turned out the church was planning to harvest the souls of the town to open a gate to Hell.”

Isaac blinked in surprise, “Is that even possible?”

“The monsters that came out of the portal were enough to convince me it is.” she says, “So, we defeated the Church and managed to close the portal, but not before everyone in town was killed. We’d become close to the man who hired us during this time, and then we found him dying. He asked me to burn his house down… so I did.”

“That’s an odd request.” he hums in thought.

Sypha huffed out a short, dry laugh, “I thought nothing of it at the time… until my partner got suspicious and looked through his belongings. And that’s when we found out he was a serial killer who murdered kids.”

“... Wow.” is all he says, all he can say, “That’s…”

Horrible? Devastating? Terrible? He’s not sure what word to use to describe her tale, not sure if there is a word for experiencing such awful blow after blow.

“Yeah,” she agrees with his lack of words, “And that’s not even getting into the details.”

“I’m so sorry you went through that.” he manages to say, “I can’t imagine what must be going through your head.”

“I just…” she sighs, “It was all so overwhelming, I feel like I wanna give up on everything and go be a hermit in the mountains or something.”

The sentiment reminds him of a certain fellow forgemaster.

“Well you’re not doing that, so I suppose you haven’t lost your sanity.” he says, quickly adding, “At least not completely.”

Sypha laughs at that, “My boyfriend would disagree.”, but almost immediately her laughter trails off, “I… I am not naive.I know there are horrible, terrible people. I’ve seen it before with my own eyes, but this… this was personal…” she chokes on a sob, her voice cracking as if on the verge of falling apart, “I let myself get used to being the hero, to winning. I let those villagers trust in me to save them, and I let every single one of them down. And to be tricked, to realize someone you thought a friend was just another link in this fucked up chain of terribleness is just… it’s too much, you know...?” she dissolves into tears as she buries her face in arms, sobbing into her sleeve

Isaac looked at the downtrodden woman in thought. Her situation was painfully familiar, one he had lived through several times. Each time was less painful than the last, but the first time is the one that hurts the most, the one that creates a pit of despair and hopelessness.

Something within him stirred, wanting to pull her out of it. It was strange and foreign, and yet he recognized it as a basic human desire to connect, to help. He recalled the Captain’s advice, about teaching rather than punishing.

“I can’t promise you something like that won’t happen again,” he admits, “The world is cruel, and it becomes crueler each time it reminds you. I think it’s impossible not to have your faith in humanity lost…”

She shrinks just the slightest, whimpering into her arms.

“However… I don’t think losing faith is a bad thing,” he continues thoughtfully, “I think it’s alright to stop and question everything, to wonder what the point of it all is. It helps you see the bigger picture.”

“...Really?” she asks in a meek voice, picking her head up to meet his gentle eyes with her teary ones.

“It can give us a chance to rebuild it. Sort of like these ruins,” he explains as he motions to the destruction around them, “Right now it is in shambles, yes, but some day people will come here and see possibilities for many things.”

“Maybe a trading town, or a village to raise families in.” she agrees, smiling the tiniest smile, “Stronger than it was before.”

“Precisely.” the forgemaster smiled, laying a hand on her shoulder, “To say that good will always prevail is a lie, but it exists. Perhaps that is enough.”

The last sentence was just as much for himself as it was for her.

Sypha straightened herself up and wiped her face with her sleeve, laying her hand over his, “You’re a good soul, Isaac.” she says, “Thank you for reminding me why I fight."

“Thank you for listening.” he replied with a chuckle.

She looks at him in thought for a moment, before standing, “Would you like to join us for dinner?” she asked as she held out her hand.

Isaac looked between it and her before taking it, “It would be a pleasure.”


End file.
